Just in Time for the Elections!
Professor Offers a History of Sincerity

April 2000  -  Trinity University history professor John Martin is taking a great interest in this year's presidential elections.  For Martin, watching the candidates' campaigns has provided rich material for his research on the question and importance of sincerity. According to Martin, the idea of sincerity--that a person's words reflect his or her inner self--only goes back about 500 years.  Before this time, most people shared collective values, so they all believed the same things.  In the 16th century, however, society began to see a flowering of individualism.  "People began to ask the question of whether a person was sincere or not because everyone's inner self was thought to be fundamentally different," says Martin. By the golden age of court society, from the 17th through 18th centuries, courtiers felt that sincerity was a detriment to becoming successful.  At about the same time, critics became very vocal on the need to be sincere. In the 19th and through most of the 20th century, sincerity became the way we relate to one another.  "We needed sincerity, for democracy, for capitalism, and for society," says Martin, although we now know that words may not necessarily reflect a person's true self. Which brings us back to the elections.  Martin says voters can see if a candidate is honest by looking at his record, but they can't prove he is sincere because that is a claim about a person's inner self which can't be known.  According to Martin, that hasn't stopped the voters from wanting a sincere president. To speak to John Martin about his research on the history of sincerity, contact Russell Guerrero at (210) 999-8406 or by e-mail at rguerrer@trinity.edu.

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Last updated on June 7, 2000 by the Office of Public Relations